Ardath: The Story of a Dead Self Part 54

"AEea's Isle was wondering at the moon"..

in which the word "wondering" paints a whole landscape of dreamy enchantment, and the couplet in the "Ode to a Nightingale," that speaks with a delicious vagueness of

"Magic cas.e.m.e.nts opening on the foam Of perilous seas in faery lands forlorn,"--

are absolutely unique and unrivalled, as is the exquisite alliteration taken from a poet of our own day:

"The holy lark, With fire from heaven and sunlight on his wing, Who wakes the world with witcheries of the dark, Renewed in rapture in the reddening air!"

Again from the same:

"The chords of the lute are entranced With the weight of the wonder of things";

and

"his skyward notes Have drenched the summer with the dews of song! ..."

this last line being certainly one of the most suggestive and beautiful in all poetical literature. Such expressions have the intrinsic quality of COMPLETENESS,--once said, we feel that they can never be said again;--they belong to the centuries, rather than the seasons, and any imitation of them we immediately and instinctively resent as an outrage.

And Theos Alwyn was essentially, and above all things, faithful to the lofty purpose of his calling,--he dealt with his art reverently, and not in rough haste and scrambling carelessness,--if he worked out any idea in rhyme, the idea was distinct and the rhyme was perfect,--he was not content, like Browning, to jumble together such hideous and ludicrous combinations as "high;--Humph!" and "triumph,"--moreover, he knew that what he had to tell his public must be told comprehensively, yet grandly, with all the authority and persuasiveness of incisive rhetoric, yet also with all the sweetness and fascination of a pa.s.sioned love-song. Occupied with such work as this, London, with its myriad mad noises and vulgar distractions, became impossible to him,--and Villiers, his fidus Achates, who had read portions of his great poem and was impatient to see it finished, knowing, as he did, what an enormous sensation it would create when published, warmly seconded his own desire to gain a couple of months complete seclusion and tranquillity.

He left town, therefore, about the middle of May and started across the Channel, resolving to make for Switzerland by the leisurely and delightful way of the Rhine, in order to visit Bonn, the scene of his old student days. What days they had been!--days of dreaming, more than action, for he had always regarded learning as a pastime rather than a drudgery, and so had easily distanced his comrades in the race for knowledge. While they were flirting with the Lischen or Gretchen of the hour, he had willingly absorbed himself in study--thus he had attained the head of his cla.s.ses with scarce an effort, and, in fact, had often found time hanging heavily on his hands for want of something more to do. He had astonished the university professors--but he had not astonished himself, inasmuch as no special branch of learning presented any difficulties to him, and the more he mastered the more dissatisfied he became. It had seemed such a little thing to win the honors of scholars.h.i.+p! for at that time his ambition was always climbing up the apparently inaccessible heights of fame,--fame, that he then imagined was the greatest glory any human being could aspire to. He smiled as he recollected this, and thought how changed he was since then! What a difference between the former discontented mutability of his nature, and the deep, unswerving calm of patience that characterized it now!

Learning and scholars.h.i.+p? these were the mere child's alphabet of things,--and fame was a pa.s.sing breath that ruffled for one brief moment the on-rus.h.i.+ng flood of time--a bubble blown in the air to break into nothingness. Thus much wisdom he had acquired,--and what more? A great deal more! he had won the difficult comprehension of HIMSELF; he had grasped the priceless knowledge that man has no enemy save THAT WHICH IS WITHIN HIM, and that the pride of a rebellious Will is the parent Sin from which all others are generated. The old Scriptural saying is true for all time, that through pride the angels fell; and it is only through humility that they will ever rise again. Pride! the proud Will that is left FREE by Divine Law, to work for itself and answer for itself, and wreak upon its own head the punishment of its own errors,--the Will that once voluntarily crushed down, in the dust at the Cross of Christ, with these words truly drawn from the depths of penitence, "Lord, not as I will, but as Thou wilt!" is straightway lifted up from its humiliation, a supreme, stately Force, resistless, miraculous, world-commanding;--smoothing the way for all greatness and all goodness, and guiding the happy Soul from joy to joy, from glory to glory, till Heaven itself is reached and the perfection of all love and life begins. For true humility is not slavish, as some people imagine, but rather royal, since, while acknowledging the supremacy of G.o.d, it claims close kindred with Him, and is at once invested with all the diviner virtues. Fame and wealth, the two perishable prizes for which men struggle with one another in ceaseless and cruel combat, bring no absolute satisfaction in the end--they are toys that please for a time and then grow wearisome. But the conquering of Self is a battle in which each fresh victory bestows a deeper content, a larger happiness, a more perfect peace,--and neither poverty, sickness, nor misfortune can quench the courage, or abate the ardor, of the warrior who is absorbed in a crusade against his own worser pa.s.sions. Egotism is the vice of this age,--the maxim of modern society is "each man for himself, and no one for his neighbor"--and in such a state of things, when personal interest or advantage is the chief boon desired, we cannot look for honesty in either religion, politics, or commerce. Nor can we expect any grand work to be done in art or literature. When pictures are painted and books are written for money only,--when laborers take no pleasure in labor save for the wage it brings,--when no real enthusiasm is shown in anything except the acc.u.mulation of wealth,--and when all the finer sentiments and n.o.bler instincts of men are made subject to Mammon wors.h.i.+p, is any one so mad and blind as to think that good can come of it? Nothing but evil upon evil can accrue from such a system,--and those who have prophetic eyes to see through the veil of events can perceive, even now, the not far distant end--namely, the ruin of the country that has permitted itself to degenerate into a mere nation of shopkeepers,--and something worse than ruin,--degradation!

It was past eight in the evening when Alwyn, after having spent a couple of days in bright little Brussels, arrived at Cologne. Most travelers know to their cost how noisy, narrow, and unattractive are the streets of this ancient Colonia Agrippina of the Romans,--how persistent and wearying is the rattle of the vehicles over the rough, cobbly stones--how irritating to the nerves is the incessant shrieking whistle and clank of the Rhine steamboats as they glide in, or glide out, from the cheerless and dirty pier. But at night, when these unpleasant sounds have partially subsided, and the lights twinkle in the shop-windows, and the majestic ma.s.s of the Cathedral casts its broad shadow on the moonlit Dom-Platz, and a few soldiers, with clanking swords and glittering spurs, come marching out from some dark stone archway, and the green gleam of the river sparkles along in luminous ripples,--then it is that a something weird and mystical creeps over the town, and the glamour of ancient historical memories begins to cling about its irregular buildings,--one thinks of the legendary Three Kings, and believes in them, too,--of St. Ursula and her company of virgins; of Marie de Medicis dying alone in that tumbled-down house in the Stern-ga.s.se,--of Rubens, who, it is said, here first saw the light of this world,--of an angry Satan flinging his Teufelstein from the Seven Mountains in an impotent attempt to destroy the Dom; and gradually, the indestructible romantic spell of the Rhine steals into the spirit of common things that were unlovely by day, and makes the old city beautiful under the sacred glory of the stars.

Alwyn dined at his hotel, and then, finding it still too early to retire to rest, strolled slowly across the Platz, looking up at the sublime G.o.d's Temple above him, the stately Cathedral, with its wondrously delicate carvings and flying b.u.t.tresses, on which the moonlight glittered like little points of pale flame. He knew it of old; many and many a time had he taken train from Bonn, for the sole pleasure of spending an hour in gazing on that splendid "sermon in stone,"--one of the grandest testimonies in the world of man's instinctive desire to acknowledge and honor, by his n.o.blest design and work, the unseen but felt majesty of the Creator. He had a great longing to enter it now, and ascended the steps with that intention; but, much to his vexation, the doors were shut. He walked from the side to the princ.i.p.al entrance; that superb western frontage which is so cruelly blocked in by a dwarfish street of the commonest shops and meanest houses,--and found that also closed against him. Disappointed and sorry, he went back again to the side of the colossal structure, and stood on the top of the steps, close to the central barred doors, studying the sculptured saints in the niches, and feeling a sudden, singular impression of extreme LONELINESS,--a sense of being shut out, as it were, from some high festival in which he would gladly have taken part.

Not a cloud was in the sky, ... the evening was one of the most absolute calm, and a delicious warmth pervaded the air,--the warmth of a fully declared and balmy spring. The Platz was almost deserted,--only a few persons crossed it now and then, like flitting shadows,--and somewhere down in one of the opposite streets a long way off, there was a sound of men's voices singing a part-song. Presently, however, this distant music ceased, and a deep silence followed. Alwyn still remained in the sombre shade of the cathedral archway, arguing with himself against the foolish and unaccountable depression that had seized him, and watching the brilliant May moon soar up higher and higher in the heavens; when,--all at once, the throbbing murmur of the great organ inside the Dom startled him from pensive dreaminess into swift attention. He listened,--the rich, round notes thundered through the stillness with forceful and majestic harmony; anon, wierd tones, like the pa.s.sionate lament of Sarasate's "Zigeunerweisen" floated around and above him: then, a silvery chorus of young voices broke forth in solemn unison:

"Kyrie Eleison! Christe Eleison! Kyrie Eleison!"

A faint cold tremor crept through his veins,--his heart beat violently,--again he vainly strove to open the great door. Was there a choir practising inside at this hour of the night? Surely not!

Then,--from whence had this music its origin? Stooping, he bent his ear to the crevice of the closed portal,--but, as suddenly as they had begun, the harmonies ceased; and all was once more profoundly still.

Drawing a long, deep breath, he stood for a moment amazed and lost in thought--these sounds, he felt sure, were not of earth but of heaven!

they had the same ringing sweetness as those he had heard on the Field of Ardath! What might they mean to him, here and now? Quick as a flash the answer came--DEATH! G.o.d had taken pity upon his solitary earth wanderings,--and the prayers of Edris had shortened his world-exile and probation! He was to die! and that solemn singing was the warning,--or the promise,--of his approaching end!

Yes! it must be so, he decided, as, with a strange, half-sad peace at his heart, he quietly descended the steps of the Dom,-he would perhaps be permitted to finish the work he was at present doing,--and then,--then, the poet-pen would be laid aside forever, chains would be undone, and he would be set at liberty! Such was his fixed idea. Was he glad of the prospect, he asked himself? Yes, and No! For himself he was glad; but in these latter days he had come to understand the thousand wordless wants and aspirations of mankind,--wants and aspirations to which only the Poet can give fitting speech; he had begun to see how much can be done to cheer and raise and enn.o.ble the world by even ONE true, brave, earnest, and unselfish worker,--and he had attained to such a height in sympathetic comprehension of the difficulties and drawbacks of others, that he had ceased to consider himself at all in the question, either with regard to the Present or the immortal Future,--he was, without knowing it, in the simple, unconsciously perfect att.i.tude of a Soul that is absolutely at one with G.o.d, and that thus, in involuntary G.o.d-likeness, is only happy in the engendering of happiness. He believed that, with the Divine help, he could do a lasting good for his fellow-men,--and to this cause he was willing to sacrifice everything that pertained to his own mere personal advantage.

But now,--now,--or so he imagined,--he was not to be allowed to pursue his labors of love,--his trial was to end suddenly,--and he, so long banished from his higher heritage, was to be restored to it without delay,--restored and drawn back to the land of perfect loveliness where Edris, his Angel, waited for him, his saint, his queen, his bride!

A thrill of ecstatic joy rushed through him,--joy intermingled with an almost supernal pain. For he had not as yet said enough to the world,--the world of many afflictions,--the little Sorrowful Star covered with toiling, anxious, deluded G.o.d-forgetting millions, in every unit of which was a spark of Heavenly flame, a germ of the spiritual essence that makes the angel, if only fostered aright.

Lost in a deep reverie, his footsteps had led him unconsciously to the Rhine bridge,--paying the customary fee, he walked about half-way across it, and stood for a while listening to the incessant swift rush of the river beneath him. Lights twinkled from the boats moored on either side,--the moon poured down a wide shower of white beams on the rapid flood,--the city, dusky and dream-like, crowned with the majestic towers of the Dom, looked picturesquely calm and grand--it was a night of perfect beauty and wondrous peace. And he was to die!--to die and leave all this, the present fairness of the world,--he was to depart, with, as he felt, his message half unspoken,--he was to be made eternally happy, while many of the thousands he left behind were, through ignorance, wilfully electing to be eternally miserable! A great, almost divine longing to save ONE,--only ONE downward drifting soul, possessed him,--and the comprehension of Christ's Sacrifice was no longer a mystery! Yet he was so certain that death, sudden and speedy closely, awaited him that he seemed to feel it in the very air,--not like a coming chill of dread, but like the soft approach of some holy seraph bringing benediction. It mattered little to him that he was actually in the very plenitude of health and strength,--that perhaps in all his life he had never felt such a keen delight in the physical perfection of his manhood as now,--death, without warning and at a touch, could smite down the most vigorous, and to be so smitten, he believed, was his imminent destiny. And while he lingered on the bridge, fancy-perplexed between grief and joy, a small window opened in a quaint house that bent its bulging gables crookedly over the gleaming water, and a girl, holding a small lamp, looked out for a moment. Her face, fresh and smiling, was fair to see against the background of dense shadow,--the light she carried flashed like a star,--and leaning down from the lattice she sang half-timidly, half mischievously, the first two or three bars of the old song.. "Du, du, liegst in mein Herzen ... !" "Ah! Gute Nacht, Liebchen!" said a man's voice below.

"Gute Nacht! Schlafen sie wohl!"

A light laugh, and the window closed, "Good-night! Sleep well!" Love's best wis.h.!.+--and for some sad souls life's last hope,--a "good-night and sleep well!" Poor tired World, for whose weary inhabitants oftentimes the greatest blessing is sleep! Good-night! sleep well! but the sleep implies waking.--waking to a morning of pleasure or sorrow,--or labor that is only lightened by,--Love! Love!--love divine,--love human,--and, sweetest love of all for us, as Christ has taught when both divine and human are mingled in one!

Alwyn, glancing up at the cl.u.s.tering stars, hanging like pendent fire-jewels above him, thought of this marvel-glory of Love,--this celestial visitant who, on noiseless pinions, comes flying divinely into the poorest homes, transfiguring common life with ethereal radiance, making toil easy, giving beauty to the plainest faces and poetry to the dullest brains. Love! its tremulous hand-clasp,--its rapturous kiss,--the speechless eloquence it gives to gentle eyes!--the grace it bestows on even the smallest gift from lover to beloved, were such gift but a handful of meadow blossoms tied with some silken threads of hair!

Not for the poet creator of "Nourhulma" such love any more,--had he not drained the cup of Pa.s.sion to the dregs in the far Past, and tasted its mixed sweetness and bitterness to no purpose save self-indulgence? All that was over;--and yet, as he walked away from the bridge, back to his hotel in the quiet moonlight, he thought what a transcendent thing Love might be, even on earth, between two whose spirits were SPIRITUALLY AKIN,--whose lives were like two notes played in tuneful concord,--whose hearts beat echoing faith and tenderness to one another,--and who held their love as a sacred bond of union--a gift from G.o.d, not to be despoiled by that rough familiarity which surely brings contempt. And then before his fancy appeared to float the radiant visage of Edris, half-child, half-angel,--he seemed to see her beautiful eyes, so pure, so clear, so unshadowed by any knowledge of sin,--and the exquisite lines of a poet-contemporary, whose work he specially admired, occurred to him with singular suggestiveness:

"Oh, thou'lt confess that love from man to maid Is more than kingdoms,--more than light and shade In sky-built gardens where the minstrels dwell, And more than ransom from the bonds of h.e.l.l.

Thou wilt, I say, admit the truth of this, And half relent that, shrinking from a kiss, Thou didst consign me to mine own disdain, Athwart the raptures of a vision'd bliss.

"I'll seek no joy that is not linked with thine, No touch of hope, no taste of holy wine, And after death, no home in any star, That is not shared by thee, supreme, afar

As here thou'rt first and foremost of all things!

Glory is thine, and gladness, and the wings That wait on thought, when, in thy spirit-sway, Thou dost invest a realm unknown to kings!"

Had not she, Edris, consigned him to his "own disdain, Athwart the raptures of a visioned bliss?" Ay! truly and deservedly!--and this disdain of himself had now reached its culminating point,--namely, that he did not consider himself worthy of her love,--or worthy to do aught than sink again into far s.p.a.ces of darkness and perpetually retrospective Memory, there to explore the uttermost depths of anguish, and count up his errors one by one from the very beginning of life, in every separate phase he had pa.s.sed through, till he had penitently striven his best to atone for them all! Christ had atoned! yes,--but was it not almost base on his part to s.h.i.+eld himself with that Divine Light and do nothing further? He could not yet thoroughly grasp the amazing truth that ONE ABSOLUTELY PURE act of faith in Christ, blots out Past Sin forever,--it seemed too marvellous and great a boon!

When he retired to rest that night he was fully and firmly PREPARED TO DIE. With this expectation upon him he was nevertheless happy and tranquil. The line--"Glory is thine, and gladness, and the wings"

haunted him, and he repeated it over and over again without knowing why. Wings! the brilliant shafts of radiance that part angels from mortals,--wings, that, after all, are not really wings, but lambent rays of living lightning, of which neither painter nor poet has any true conception, . . long, dazzling rays such as encircled G.o.d's maiden, Edris, with an arch of roseate effulgence, so that the very air was sunset-colored in the splendor of her presence! How if she were a wingless angel,--made woman?

"Glory is thine, and gladness, and the wings!" And with the name of his angel-love upon his lips he closed his eyes and sank into a deep and dreamless slumber.

CHAPTER XL.

IN THE CATHEDRAL.

A booming, thunderous, yet mellow sound! a grand, solemn, sonorous swing of full and weighty rhythm, striking the air with deep, slowly measured resonance like the rolling of close cannon! Awake, all ye people!--Awake to prayer and praise! for the Night is past and sweet Morning reddens in the east, ... another Day is born,--a day in which to win G.o.d's grace and pardon,--another wonder of Light, Movement, Creation, Beauty, Love! Awake, awake! Be glad and grateful for the present joy of life,--this life, dear harbinger of life to come! open your eyes, ye drowsy mortals, to the divine blue of the beneficent sky, the golden beams of the sun, the color of flowers, the foliage of trees, the flash of sparkling waters!--open your ears to the singing of birds, the whispering of winds, the gay ripple of children's laughter, the soft murmurs of home affection,--for all these things are freely bestowed upon you with each breaking dawn, and will you offer unto G.o.d NO thanksgiving?--Awake! Awake! the Voice you have yourselves set in your high Cathedral towers reproaches your lack of love with its iron tongue, and summons you all to wors.h.i.+p Him the Ever-Glorious, through whose mercy alone you live!

To and fro,--to and fro,--gravely persistent, sublimely eloquent, the huge, sustained, and heavy monotone went thudding through the stillness,--till, startled from his profound sleep by such loud, lofty, and incessant clangor, Alwyn turned on his pillow and listened, half-aroused, half-bewildered,--then, remembering where he was, he understood; it was the great Bell of the Dom pealing forth its first summons to the earliest Ma.s.s. He lay quiet for a little while, dreamily counting the number of reverberations each separate stroke sent quivering on the air,--but presently, finding it impossible to sleep again, he got up, and drawing aside the curtain looked out of the window of his room, which fronted on the Platz. Though it was not yet six o'clock, the city was all astir,--the Rhinelanders are an early working people, and to see the sun rise is not with them a mere fiction of poesy, but a daily fact. It was one of the loveliest of lovely spring mornings--the sky was clear as a pale, polished sapphire, and every little bib of delicate carving and sculpture on the Dom stood out from its groundwork with microscopically beautiful distinctness. And as his gaze rested on the perfect fairness of the day, a strange and sudden sense of rapturous antic.i.p.ation possessed his mind,--he felt as one prepared for some high and exquisite happiness,--some great and wondrous celebration or feast of joy! The thoughts of death, on which he had brooded so persistently during the past yester-eve, had fled, leaving no trace behind,--only a keen and vigorous delight in life absorbed him now. It was good to be alive, even on this present earth!

it was good to see, to feel, to know! and there was much to be thankful for in the mere capability of easy and healthful breathing!

Full of a singular light-heartedness, he hummed a soft tune to himself as he moved about his room,--his desire to view the interior of the Cathedral had not abated with sleep, but had rather augmented,--and he resolved to visit it now, while he had the chance of beholding it in all the impressive splendor of uncrowded tranquillity. For he knew that by the time he was dressed, the first Ma.s.s would be over,--the priests and people would be gone,--and he would be alone to enjoy the magnificence of the place in full poet-luxury,--the luxury of silence and solitude. He attired himself quickly, and with a vaguely nervous eagerness,--he was in almost as great a hurry to enter the Dom as he had been to arrive at the Field of Ardath! The same feverish impatience was upon him--impatience that he was conscious of, yet could not account for,--his fancy busied itself with a whole host of memories, and fragments of half-forgotten love-songs he had written in his youth, came back to him without his wish or will,--songs that he instinctively felt belonged to his Past, when as "Sah-luma" he had won golden opinions in Al-Kyris. And though they were but echoes, they seemed this morning to touch him with half-pleasing, half-tender suggestiveness,--two lines especially from the Idyl of Roses he had penned so long,--ah! so very long ago,--came floating through his brain like a message sent from some other world,--

"By the pureness of love shall our glory in loving increase, And the roses of pa.s.sion for us are the lilies of peace."

The "lilies of peace" and the flowers of Ardath,--the "roses of pa.s.sion" and the love of Edris, these were all mingled almost unconsciously in his thoughts, as with an inexplicable, happy sense of tremulous expectation,--expectation of he knew not what-he went, walking as one in haste, across the broad Platz and ascended the steps of the Cathedral. But the side-entrance was fast shut, as on the previous night,--he therefore made his rapid way round to the great western door. That stood open,--the bell had long ago ceased,--Ma.s.s was over,--and all was profoundly still.

Out of the warm sunlit air he stepped into the vast, cool, clear-obscure, white glory of the stately shrine,--with bared head and noiseless, reverent feet, he advanced a little way up the nave, and then stood motionless, every artistic perception in him satisfied, soothed, and entranced anew, as in his student-days, by the tranquil grandeur of the scene. What majestic silence! What hallowed peace! How jewel-like the radiance of the sun pouring through the rich stained gla.s.s on those superb carved pillars, that, like petrified stems of forest-trees, bear lightly up the lofty, vaulted roof to that vast height suggestive of a white sky rather than stone!

Moving on slowly further toward the altar, he was suddenly seized by an overpowering impression,--a memory that rushed upon him with a sort of shock, albeit it was only the memory of a tune!--a wild melody, haunting and pa.s.sionate, rang in his eras,--the melody that Sarasate, the Orpheus of Spain, had evoked from the heart of his speaking violin,--the sobbing love-lament of the "Zigeunerweisen"--the weird minor-music that had so forcibly suggested--What? THIS VERY PLACE!--these snowy columns,--this sculptured sanct.i.ty--this flas.h.i.+ng light of rose and blue and amber,--this wondrous hush of consecrated calm! What next? Dear G.o.d! Sweet Christ! what next? The face of Edris?--Would that heavenly countenance s.h.i.+ne suddenly though those rainbow-colored beams that struck slantwise down toward him?--and should he presently hear her dulcet voice charming the silence into deeper ecstasy?

Overcome by a sensation that was something like fear, he stopped abruptly, and leaning against one of the quaint old oaken benches, strove to control the quick, excited throbbing of his heart,--then gradually, very gradually he become conscious that HE WAS NOT ALONE,--another besides himself was in the church,--another, whom it was necessary for him to see!

He could not tell how he first grew to be certain of this,--but he was soon so completely possessed by the idea, that for a moment he dared not raise his eyes, or move! Some invincible force held him there spell-bound, yet trembling in every limb,--and while he thus waited hesitatingly, the great organ woke up in a glory of tuneful utterance,--wave after wave of richest harmony rolled through the stately aisles and ... "Kyrie eleison! Kyrie eleison!" rang forth in loud, full, and golden-toned chorus!

Lifting his head, he stared wonderingly around him; not a living creature was visible in all the s.p.a.cious width and length of the cathedral! His lips parted,--he felt as though he could scarcely breathe,--strong shudders ran through him, and he was penetrated by a pleasing terror that was almost a physical pang,--an agonized entrancement, like death or the desire of love! Presently, mastering himself by a determined effort, he advanced steadily with the absorbed air of one who is drawn along by magnetic power ... steadily and slowly up the nave, ... and as he went, the music surged more tumultuously among the vaulted arches,--there was a faint echo afar off, as of tinkling crystal bells; and at each onward step he gained a new access of courage, strength, firmness, and untrammelled ease, till every timorous doubt and fear had fled away, and he stood directly in front of the altar railing, gazing at the enshrined Cross, and seeing for the moment nothing save that Divine Symbol alone. And still the organ played, and still the voices sang,--he knew these sounds were not of earth, and he also knew that they were intended to convey a meaning to him,--but WHAT meaning?

All at once, moved by a sudden impulse, he turned toward the right hand side of the altar, where the great statue of St. Christopher stands, and where one of the loveliest windows in the world gleams like a great carven gem aloft, filtering the light through a myriad marvellous shades of color, and there he beheld, kneeling on the stone pavement, one solitary wors.h.i.+pper,--a girl. Her hands were clasped, and her face was bent upon them so that her features were not visible,--but the radiance from the window fell on her uncovered golden hair, encircling it with the glistening splendor of a heavenly nimbus,--and round her slight, devotional figure, rays of azure and rose jasper and emerald, flickered in wide and l.u.s.trous patterns, like the glow of the setting sun on a translucent sea. How very still she was! ... how fervently absorbed in prayer!